Tuesday, July 4, 2017

Belarusians March against Russian-Belarusian Military Exercise as Moscow Plans Another in Uzbekistan

Paul
Goble

Staunton, July 4 – Several hundred
Belarusians staged an independent protest in Minsk against plans for a joint
Belarusian-Russian military exercise later this year (Zapad-2017) that Moscow
has acknowledged is a response to the NATO build-up in eastern Europe but that
Belarusians fear may be used by Moscow to increase Russian control of Belarus.

The demonstration took place on the sidelines
of the official celebrations of what Alyaksandr Lukashenka insists is the
country’s independence day, the anniversary of the Soviet expulsion of German
forces from Minsk in 1944. Belarusian opposition groups mark the anniversary of
the proclamation of the Belarusian People’s Republic on March 25.

Opposition leader Nikolay Statkevich
told the marchers that “we know perfectly well who runs Russia and what they
allow themselves to do and we very well remember how Russian peacekeepers began
the war with Georgia and how it was with the Black Sea fleet when Russia with
its help seized Crimea.”

But
even as Belarusians protested against what they fear will be a massive influx
of Russian troops and military equipment that could be used to subvert and
subjugate their country, Moscow and Tashkent announced that in October, there
will be a joint Russian-Uzbek military exercise, the first since 2007 and only
the second since 1991 (fergananews.com/news/26584).

The first, which came soon after the
Andizhan tragedy, played a key role in warming relations between Tashkent and
Moscow. Western countries were critical of Islam Karimov’s actions in that city
and imposed sanctions. Moscow wasn’t, and Tashkent responded by increasing its
involvement with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

Russian officials expressed the hope
that such joint exercises would become regular even annual events, but there
hasn’t been on in the intervening decade. Now, with a new Uzbek leader in
place, Moscow appears trying to take advantage of that, perhaps hopeful it can
get Tashkent to rejoin the Organization for the Collective Security Treaty,
that Uzbekistan left in 2012.